Food Talk

From the Toronto Sun:

Many artificial food dyes that colour everything from breakfast cereal to ice cream should be banned because they pose cancer risks, a new report from the Center for Science in the Public Interest says.

“These synthetic chemicals do absolutely nothing to improve the nutritional quality or safety of foods, but trigger behaviour problems in children and, possibly, cancer in anybody,” said CSPI executive director Michael F. Jacobson, co-author of the report, Food Dyes: A Rainbow of Risks.

Manufacturers worldwide each year use about seven million kilograms of artificial colours in common prepared foods like cookies, candy, pop and ice cream.

The three most widely used food dyes —Red 40, Yellow 5 and Yellow 6 — are known to be contaminated with carcinogens, the Washington-based health watchdog organization said.

Evidence suggests, but does not prove, that other dyes — Blue 1, Blue 2, Green 3 and Red 40 — cause cancer in animals, the CSPI report said.

Before making any knee-jerk reactions, this is about artificial food coloring. Meaning, from synthetic sources. The study does not cover natural food coloring such as annatto seed extract.

One interesting angle is the move to ban dyed foods altogether as the practice of food coloring constitutes an “adulteration.”